The Fiend
by Fammi Capire
Summary: Severus Snape believes that he will be relaxing and spending the rest of his days in peaceful retirement from the wizarding world. Until a fiend from hell arrives and changes that. Based off an old Steeleye Span folk song. Will not be continued for the sake of my own mental sanity.


_A/N: Quite possibly the least favorite of all the writings I have ever done. Posting it for the "what-the-hell" factor of it all. Wrote it several years ago. It's to a folk song that my mother used to me a long time ago. I changed a ton of the lyrics as I went. It may be a little convoluted and hard to follow, so good luck._

_Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine. Song isn't mine either. Yup._

_Let never a man a wooing wend  
That lacketh things three,  
A store of gold, and open heart,  
And full of charity;  
And this was seen of Severus Snape  
Though he lay quite alone,  
For he's taken him to a haunted hall  
Seven miles from the town._

It has always been said that for a man to be truly happy he must possess three things: abundant money, an open heart, and charity towards his neighbor. These were qualities that nobody thought one certain wizard would ever possess. At this point, people believed that if he ever had possessed any of those qualities, he had lost them during the war. Society saw him as a murderer, a spy, an all around evil person.

So, he withdrew from society, leaving what little he had left behind. Dumbledore had left him with a small summer cottage after he had murdered him. Well, he had not exactly _left_ it to him, per se. But if you are the only secret keeper of a place and no other people know about it, then why not use it. Plus, he reasoned that if Dumbledore had not wanted him to have it, he would have found somebody else to be the secret keeper.

The cottage was small, but more that sufficient for Snape to hide away from the prying eyes of society. It was located in the middle of a moderately sized strip of land that on one side bordered a large lake, and on the other was just fields and forest. It supplied the Potions Master with everything he would need: good hunting for food, plentiful fertile land for growing potions ingredients, and a wide parameter so that he could avoid any social confrontations. At the south east end of the property was a small road that, seven miles down, led to a small muggle town where Snape was able to get anything else he needed.

The muggles never bothered the tall, dark man when he came into town. Nobody seemed to know where he came from either. Years ago, he would occasionally show up, maybe once in a blue moon. However, as of three years ago, they would see him much more frequently, maybe once or twice a month. As with every stranger who came into their small, tight-knit town, rumors flew about this mysterious man. They knew that he must live somewhere in the mountains, but nobody knew where in specific.

There was a whole other mysterious story connected to that cottage. One of the muggle's great-great grandfather had seen it one day when he was hiking in the woods up my the lake when he was a teenager. There had been bright lights flashing at one edge of the forest, and being a curious teenaged boy, he had gone to investigate. When he got there, he saw two men, one with a long beard and a purple dress-like garment, and the other wearing what looked to be a leather fur-lined cape, throwing bright lights at each other with small pointed sticks. He watched from the edge of the woods, laying on the ground to stay away from the bright lights that were flying over his head. Finally after quite a while watching the two strange men battle, the one in the purple had thrown one last stream of green light at the other man. The boy managed to hear the words that the man had shouted because suddenly everything was eerily silent. "_Avada-kadavra." _The boy watched as the green light hit the other man and he disintegrated where he stood, vanishing into thin air. The purple clad wizard raised up one of his hands and said, _"Let this be a lesson to the greedy."_ As he spoke these words a large red bird that looked as though it was on fire flew down from the tree that the boy was crouching under and flew right to the man. The man reached one of his hands up as the beautiful bird flew over him and grabbed his tail. Within seconds, they both seemed to burst into flame and then they vanished.

The boy only took a moment to stare at the cottage that was the only other thing that was there. The only other thing that had witnessed this... _event._ He stood there for a moment, too shocked to move. Finally, he gained bank his ability to use his limbs and he ran the entire seven miles to his home. Nobody ever saw the cottage again, but they believed that it existed because it was the most normal part of the boy's entire story. The cottage became a myth to the muggles. Every citizen that lived in that town knew that somewhere in those woods, there was a cottage by the lake. Because of the sheer mystery behind both the cottage and the man, they connected the two together.

_He's chased the deer now him before  
And the doe down by the den  
Till the fattest buck in all the flock  
King Henry he has slain.  
His huntsmen followed him to the hall  
To make them burly cheer,  
When loud the wind was heard to sound  
And an earthquake rocked the floor.  
_

This was Snape's new life. He did not even receive copies of the Prophet. He had no clue what happened in the wizarding world, and the only news of the muggle world he attained was from his once or twice monthly visits into town. The monotony of his daily rituals never bothered him. In fact, he welcomed his new life in which nothing would randomly change. And that was how he lived... until Fate's capricious ways decided that he needed a change.

As usual, he woke up that morning and went about his brewing business. After lunch, he went out for a walk around the property. He was just about to walk back through the gate to the cottage when all of a sudden, the ground started to tremble beneath his feet. Earthquakes in this part of Scottland were infrequent but none the less they occurred, so thinking nothing of it he walked into his cottage. As soon as he had stepped over his door mat, the ground trembled again, this time harder. There was a blood curdeling scream from one of spare bedrooms on the second floor of the cottage. Snape drew his wand and ran up the stairs two at a time. Who had the audacity to intrude on his property like this? And how _in Merlin's godforsaken name_ did they manage to get into his cottage without him noticing the wards being broken?

_And darkness covered all the hall  
Where they sat at their meat,  
The grey dogs, yowling, left their food  
And crept to Henry's feet.  
And louder howled the rising wind  
And burst the fastened door,  
__And in there came a grisly ghost  
Stramping on the floor._

The room the scream was coming from was his spare bedroom converted to a library. Poised to counter any attack, Snape opened the door. As soon as the door was opened, the screaming stopped. The room was dark. There was no light what so ever. He found this especially peculiar because he had opened the window this morning and there should have been day light coming in.

"Careful, my dear boy," Dumbledore's voice came from the portrait that hung from the far side of the room.

"What the hell is going on Albus?"

"Well, my boy, it seems you have an important visitor," the old wizard replied as Snape lit the the lamps and watched as the light was quickly extinguished once again.

"How the hell am I supposed to _see_ the visitor if the stupid lights keep going out? Is this some kind of joke Albus? Honestly, I have better things to be doing than dealing with your tomfoolery," Snape growled as he finally cast a glowing charm on one of the chairs so that it would illuminate the room.

"Honesly, Severus. She does not want to be seen. She's afraid." Snape could just imagine the twinkle in his mentor's painted eyes.

"_SHE?_" What the hell was going on? His eyes grew accustomed to the eerie green light and settled on a large mass that was layed on his floor. He watched in disgust as the lump rose up slowly.

"Yes, Severus, my boy. You're the only one who can help her. She's cursed with Dark Magic."

_Her head hit the roof-tree of the house,  
Her middle you could not span,  
Each frightened huntsman fled the hall  
And left the king alone,  
Her teeth were like the tether stakes,  
Her nose like club or mell,  
And nothing less she seemed to be  
Than a fiend that comes form hell.  
_

Snape felt the bile in his stomach raise to his throat as the hideous creature raised her face to him. Her skin, or at least what was left of it was snagged and pulled, and he could see the sinew of muscle in the places where the skin had been ripped clear off her face. Her eyes glowed an unhuman shade of yellow. She slowly stood up to her full height, her disgusting head touching the ceiling. She opened her mouth and took in a long shuddering breath. He could see her teeth, or at least, what should have been her teeth, because those were most definitely not teeth. _They were moving._ Her nose was even larger and lumpier than his own, and that was saying a lot. Never in his whole life had he seen a creature so hideous and terrible. Even the inferi were better than this _thing_, whatever _it_ was. Even in his career as a Death Eater, Snape had never faced a being that he felt this weak and frightened as this thing.

"_Some meat, some meat you King Henry,  
Some meat you give to me,  
Go kill a stag you King Henry  
And bring him here to me;"_

The voice that came from the fiend that was towering before him was a mix between a howl, a screech, and a sharp hiss. It chilled him to his bones and seemed to travel right through him. He felt weak against this being, and knew that bad things would happen if he did not obey.

_He's gone and slain his berry brown steed  
Though it made his heart full sore,  
For she's eaten up both skin and bone  
Left nothing but hide and hair.  
_

He quickly went, tracked down a large buck, killed it, and levitated it back to the house. He had barely made it into the door when the fiend ravenously attacked the buck. He was petrified as he stood at the door and watched the fiend feast on the buck. She ate the whole beast, skin and bones included, leaving behind only hide and hair.

_"More meat, more meat you King Henry  
More meat you give to me,  
Go Kill ten groundhogs King Henry  
And bring them here to me;"_

Snape's lank hair stood on end as he received his next command. This was worse than his work for the Dark Lord himself.

_And when he's slain the ten ground hogs,  
It made his heart full sore,  
She's eaten them up both skin and bone,  
Left nothing but hide and hair.  
_

Once again, he hunted for the animals, aided by his magic. He contemplated running for his life, but there was little chance that the fiend wouldn't go after him. He was stuck.. What Dumbledore's portrait had said was that she (he was starting to wonder how the former headmaster had even come to that conclusion...) was under a curse and that he was the only one that could help her. And yet, never in his life has he been exposed to such levels of Black Magic. In comparison to Voldemort's Dark Magic capacities, Voldemort's magic was that of a kitten, and this one was of a lion. Quaking in his dragon hide boots, Snape brought back the groundhogs and had barely layed them out before the ravenous fiend had already begun to feast on them. She devoured every last animal, once again leaving only the hide and hair of them. Once again, she looked up at Snape and in that terrifying voice said,

_"More meat, more meat you King Henry  
More meat you give to me,  
Go fell your goshawks King Henry  
And bring them here to me;"_

Once again, the painful voice commanded, and he found himself unable to not follow the directions he was given.

_And when he's slain his gay goshawks,  
It made his heart full sore,  
She's eaten them up both skin and bone,  
Left nothing but feathers bare.  
_

His black owl had been a faithful messenger throughout his time as a teacher at Hogwarts. It killed him inside to serve it up on a silver platter to the fiend. He had done so much worse to human beings as a death eater. However, it felt so much more personal to kill a creature that knew no evil, a creature that had been willing to serve him regardless of his own state. The pain of it all ate at this heart, though he refused to let it show. He was a death eater. He should be able to deal with this and hide his pain behind a stony facade. The fiend devoured the bird nearly whole, save a few feathers that had escaped her hungry clutches.

"_Some drink, some drink now King Henry  
Some drink you give to me,  
Oh you sew up your horse's hide  
And bring in a drink to me,"  
_

_And he's sewed up the bloody hide  
And a pipe of wine put in,  
And she's drank it up all in one draught  
Left never a drop therein._

It's next request was easier on Snape's damaged mind. He charmed the hide that was left and conjured it full of wine from the store that he had built up in the basement, mainly consisting of Ogden's Finest. He levitated the skin back to the fiend and she drank each and every last drop, nearly licking the hide clean. When she was done, the fiend spoke once again:

_"A bed, a bed now King Henry,  
A bed you'll make for me,  
Oh you must pull the heather green  
And make it soft for me;  
And pulled has he the heather green  
And made for her a bed,  
And taken has he his gay mantle  
And o'er it he has spread.  
Take off your clothes now King Henry  
And lie down by my side,  
Now swear, now swear you King Henry  
To take me for your bride."_

He stared at the fiend in shock. Sleep with this... thing? Perish the thought! Marry it as well? He would have rather died.

_"Oh God forbid," says King Henry,  
"That ever the like betide,  
That ever a fiend that comes from hell  
Should stretch down by my side."_

He could have refused, if it had been a normal woman. However, this thing terrified him to no ends. And he knew that if he refused to grant it its wish, he might as well just breathe his last right then and there. So, without thinking much of it, he laid down on the little area of room that was now left in his bed and willed himself to fall asleep as quickly as he could.

_When the night was gone and the day was come  
And the sun shone through the hall,  
The fairest lady that ever was seen  
Lay between him and the wall._

When Snape awoke, he did not recall what had happened the day before, but he did very quickly realize that he was spooned against a warm feminine body. His mind ran at over a thousand miles trying to figure out what was going on. As far as he knew he had gone to sleep sharing his bed with a hideous fiend. Who was in his arms now? He opened his eyes only to see a head of bushy, mousy, brown hair. Brown hair that looked oddly familiar...

As though she had sensed his thoughts, the woman in his arms turned around to face him. Holy shite... It was Granger. Her brown eyes met his and she spoke:

_"I've met with many a gentle knight  
That gave me such a fill,  
But never before with a courteous knight  
That gave me all my will."_

"You broke the spell, professor. Thank you."

"Spell, Granger?"

"Yes. One I was trapped under in the final battle. Nobody was able to remove it... until now." She

pressed herself against his chest.

"I am going to go out on a limb and assume that I must keep my word in order to keep you alive and... human?" Snape eyed the beautiful, brown-haired woman who was willingly laying in his arms.

"That would be... preferable, Professor."

"Well, I am not one to mess with dark magic such as the one that you have been under the influence of. Also, if we are to be married, you may as well call me Severus."

"Likewise, then, Severus," She seemed to savor the sound of his name as it left her tongue. The more Snape though about this situation, the more he liked it. Any man at Hogwarts would have to have been either blind or under the influence of veela attentions not to notice Miss Granger, um, Hermione's elegant transition from a gawky preteenaged girl into a graceful and absolutely gorgeous smart woman. He had always considered her an intellectual equal, despite having to constantly berate her because of his status as the Slytherin Head of House and the Death Eater in residence at Hogwarts at the time.

Now, things were different, and he intended on proving to the gorgeous woman in his arms just how different they were, lest he should wake up and this all be a terrible dream.

He bent his head down and softly kissed her, trying to show her that he was a changed man.

"Miss Granger, will you do me the honor of marrying me?"

"Yes."


End file.
